Between Friends
by MrsTater
Summary: LupinTonks: In this moment, everything has changed.
1. Part One: The Moment Of Change

_**Title: **Between Friends (1/3)_

_**Author: **MrsTater_

_**Rating: **PG_

_**Pairing: **Remus Lupin/Nymphadora Tonks_

_**Summary: **In this moment, everything has changed. _

_**Author's Notes: **Originally written for the February and April 2006 RT Challenges at LiveJournal. Set during the summer between **Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire **and **Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. **_

_**Disclaimer: **This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended._

* * *

**Part One: The Moment Of Change**

"Is that you, Tonks?"

Faint as it is, Tonks is so thrilled to hear Remus' voice from the basement kitchen door that she abandons her struggle to quiet the screaming portrait. She trips to the staircase, at the bottom of which stands Remus, leaning heavily against the banister.

"I'm so glad you're awake," she says.

"Only just." Remus smiles wearily as he straightens his posture slightly. "I slept the day away."

"And to think I was afraid I wouldn't get off work before you turned in."

The flickering light of the wall sconces casts his drawn face into relief. She's seen less pronounced lines of fatigue on her own after prolonged morphs; she can only imagine what Remus' body endures during and after his extreme transformations. As Tonks descends to him, she notes his shirt is open at the neck and un-tucked; his feet are bare; his hair pokes up in all directions as though he towel dried it after a shower but didn't bothered to comb it; a day's growth of silvery beard shadows his chin and cheeks.

Remus must feel truly buggered to forego his characteristic neatness, but Tonks can't help but smile at the sight of him. He holds a steaming mug, which combines with his dishevelled look and the tangy scent of soap to make Tonks think of morning. She has an unaccountable impulse to take a sip from his cup and kiss him lazily on his mouth – which is ridiculous because this is _Remus_, and she can't enter the house without knocking over the bloody umbrella stand, and they're just friends who barely even know each other, and this certainly isn't the time…

When Remus glances away and shifts his weight, Tonks realises she's staring.

"I'm glad you're awake," she repeats.

Tilting his head, Remus looks at her with perplexity. "Do you…" His voice comes out hoarsely, so he pauses to clear his throat. "Do you need to see me about something?"

She does, but not in the way he means. Tonks needs to see Remus because last night was full moon – the first since she joined the Order and met him – and even though she's known from the beginning what he is, she senses sometimes that he doesn't fully believe she doesn't care. Like now, how he expects her to need something from him. She's here to show him once and for all that she really _does not care_.

Or that on some different level…she does.

"I just want to visit you," she says.

Though peaky, Remus looks boyish in his surprise. "Can I offer you a cup of hot chocolate?"

"That would be lovely." Tonks flashes a grin as she brushes past him to the table.

"Really?" he croaks.

Tonks turns to see him moving stiffly across the kitchen, running a hand over whatever furniture or countertop is within reach. For a moment his eyes drop self-consciously, and Tonks does her best to look nonchalant about his frailness.

"I was actually just joking," he says with a wry glance. "Hot chocolate is hardly seasonable refreshment."

"You're drinking it," says Tonks, flopping into a chair and propping her feet in the one at the head of the table.

"Full moon recovery."

"So werewolves are cocoavores, are they?"

Remus emits a puff of laughter that dissolves into a cough, but his eyes twinkle at her over the rim of his mug. "This one is."

Encouraged to see him treating his condition with a degree of humour, especially when he's almost at his lowest, Tonks says, "It all makes sense now."

Gripping back of the chair on which Tonks' feet rest, Remus arches his brows.

Tonks leans toward him conspiratorially. "Umbridge passed all those employment laws because she's afraid the werewolf population will get rich and buy up all the world's chocolate."

Remus laughs again, stronger, though still raspy. A little more colour comes into his cheeks. "With that sort of mind for conspiracies," he says, "I've no doubt you shall be Head of Aurors some day."

For no reason at all, Tonks' pulse accelerates and she realises Remus' vote of confidence means a great deal to her. She hopes that behind the joke he really means it.

"The future Head of Aurors," Tonks says, folding her arms across her chest, "wants to know if you're going to get her that hot chocolate you offered. She's not one to let conventional things like seasons dictate what she wants."

She sits back in her chair, expecting Remus to return with a quip.

Instead, he bends toward her, still leaning on the chair for support, and tugs gently at one of her pink spikes. "Why am I not surprised?"

Tonks' breath hitches as she realises Remus' voice isn't hoarse; it's husky. She hardly registers the dark rings under his eyes or how blood-shot they are, because she's drawn to their vivid colour. They gaze so deeply into hers that she can feel them tangibly inside, and Merlin – she reads in them the language of her pounding heart:

In this moment…tonight…or yesterday…or last week…or the day they met…everything has changed.

"Right," says Remus, turning. "Your hot chocolate."


	2. Part Two: The New Path

_**Title: **Between Friends (2/3)_

_**Author: **MrsTater_

_**Rating: **PG_

_**Pairing: **Remus Lupin/Nymphadora Tonks_

_**Summary: **In this moment, everything has changed. _

_**Author's Notes: **Originally written for the February and April 2006 RT Challenges at LiveJournal. Set during the summer between **Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire **and **Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. **_

_**Disclaimer: **This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended._

* * *

**Part Two: The New Path**

If Remus' scruffy hair, stubbly face, haphazard clothes, and bare feet indicate his ongoing recovery from last night's full moon, his carefulness in preparing hot chocolate for Tonks does not.

He selects a mug from the cupboard, but does not immediately fill it. First he pauses to check for chips or cracks or dust or any number of things that might lurk in the cupboards of twelve Grimmauld. Finding nothing, he wipes it out with a dishtowel anyway, then places the cup carefully on the counter. His hand shakes as he lifts the carafe, yet he pours a steady stream of cocoa.

How can he be so calm after what's passed between them? Tonks' pulse hasn't slowed yet, and her mind races like a Firebolt as she regards Remus in light of her new – or newly realised – feelings. Are Remus' deliberate, methodical actions his way of coming to terms with the change? Did things change at all on his end? Tonks thinks she read her feelings in his eyes, but she might be wrong. Or Remus might have felt something but not liked it.

Drawing his wand from his pocket, Remus flicks it airily toward a counter to his left. "_Accio_ cinnamon." Just as he replaces it, he reaches out to catch the spice, simultaneously opening the silver drawer with his right hand to retrieve a spoon.

"You take your cocoa with cinnamon, too?" Tonks asks, wondering how her first words to him can be about something as mundane as cinnamon. "That's how I like it."

His back to her, Remus tilts his head as he stirs. "I believe Sirius introduced me to cinnamon in cocoa. Black family recipe?"

"I reckon so."

Silence settles heavily on them, and Tonks feels weighed down by the uncertainty of what in Merlin's name will happen next.

"The sky is clear tonight," Remus' husky voice gently breaks into her musing.

Tonks follows his gaze up to the small, high window, through which the waning moon is visible against a blue-black, star-flecked sky. Deciding the only thing to do is to proceed as usual and let the new path, if there is one, reveal itself, Tonks says, "It's lovely out. I would've walked from the Ministry if I hadn't been afraid of missing you."

Remus' smile falters as he lowers himself into the chair across from her and slides her mug to her. As he sips his own cocoa, his eyes drift upward again to the window. Tonks curses her unfortunate choice of words that he obviously has taken as criticism of his physical state when she's not and blame for standing the way of something she never even really wanted to do. Why is she a failure at small talk? Whatever new feelings Remus might have had for her a moment ago must be gone now.

When Remus settles is gaze on her again, his pleasant smile is laced with an apology. "I would suggest we go for a walk, but it could only go as far as the front door."

Heart quickening again with this glimmer of hope, Tonks is determined to put Remus at ease as he's done for her so many times since they met.

"Hard to walk and drink cocoa at the same time," she says. "If you're me. Anyway, I think you've got the right idea."

Remus arches his brows, which accentuates the weary lines around his eyes. "I am sure whatever you are talking about would be perfectly clear to someone who did not spend last night in the body of a wolf, but my brain is as sluggish as the rest of me."

Feet still propped in the chair at the head of the table, Tonks slips off her shoes without unlacing them, then pulls off her socks with her toes. "On my feet all day," she explains. "This feels lovely."

Remus grins – at her feet. "They're cute."

Tonks tries not to grin too hugely that Remus has complimented her and used the word cute, which for some reason strikes her as amusing. She likes the way it sounds coming from his mouth, spoken in that soft, hoarse voice.

"I don't think feet can be cute," she says.

"Of course they can."

"I don't like feet." Immediately Tonks wishes the words unsaid. He'll think she's insulting _his _feet.

But Remus laughs – a low, raspy chuckle that suits the way his hair falls over his forehead and makes his eyes light up brilliantly.

"In general," he says, "I would not consider myself a fan of feet. But yours are nice."

He bends to look at hers in the chair, and even though it's only her _feet_, Tonks' insides dance that he's studying part of her as intently as she observed him. She imagines he's the sort of bloke who would give his Auror girlfriend a foot rub at the end of a long day.

But then her heart stops. What if her feet stink? She _was _on them all day, and it was very warm out. He'll not think them nice if he catches a whiff.

She's about to pull them out of the chair and onto the floor where feet belong, when Remus notes, "They're small." In a hushed, almost awed voice, he adds, "You've a toe ring."

"That I do." Tonks wiggles her toes, and the silver vine design twisted around her third toe glints in the light.

Staring in fascination, Remus asks, "Doesn't it create friction against your shoe when you walk?"

Tonks shrugs. "No. Well, it was rather annoying when I first wore it, but I'm used to it now."

"Why bother accustoming yourself to jewellery that is always hidden in your shoe?"

It's such a male thing to say, Tonks has to laugh, and Remus' slightly baffled expression adds to her mirth.

"Because it's _not_ always hidden in my shoe." Tonks pushes back her chair and lifts her foot to the table, no longer concerned about foot odour. To her delight, Remus' gaze remains on her toe ring.

"Plus _you_ like it," she says impulsively. "At least, I think you do."

Their eyes meet, and the magic passes between them again.

"I do."

Remus' mouth curves in a slow half-grin that makes Tonks' fall open. How can she not have noticed before tonight how sexy his smile is? Almost immediately the realisation dawns on her that she has never seen thislook before. Remus has smiled _at _her, but not _for _her. She slides down in her chair, feeling as though she's just eaten something rich and satiating that warms and melts her from the inside out.

"But I am afraid," says Remus raspily, "that you don't like my hot chocolate."

"Oh!" Tonks swings her feet to the floor and picks up the untouched mug so quickly she sloshes cocoa on the table. "I forgot."

"Hard to walk and drink cocoa at the same time." Remus takes a sip, and his eyes tease her over the rim of his cup.


	3. Part Three: The Long, Good Night

_**Title: **Between Friends (3/3)_

_**Author: **MrsTater_

_**Rating: **PG_

_**Pairing: **Remus Lupin/Nymphadora Tonks_

_**Summary: **In this moment, everything has changed. _

_**Author's Notes: **Originally written for the February and April 2006 RT Challenges at LiveJournal. Set during the summer between **Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire **and **Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. **_

_**Disclaimer: **This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended._

* * *

**Part Three: The Long, Good Night**

"Reckon you can walk as far as the front porch?"

The instant the impulsive question leaves Tonks' mouth, her eyes fall from Remus' face. A flush prickles up her neck and cheeks, so hot that she's sure her pink hair must have darkened a shade or two. Merlin's bloody beard! Has she gone completely mental?

It's bad enough she's suddenly thinking of his smile as sexy, and wondering how it would be to kiss him, but now she's asking him to sit on the porch. Not only asking him to sit on the porch, but asking him in a way that makes him seem a complete invalid. That's not how she meant it; she was only making reference to his earlier joke about only being able to walk as far as the door. But Remus is the only one with the right to take his condition lightly. What must he think of her? She doesn't want to know.

"I believe I could last an extra pace or two," Remus replies mildly – and to Tonks' great astonishment, she looks at him and sees that dry half-grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. He knows what she meant. He's not offended.

"It's just that it's so lovely out," Tonks says quickly, raising her mug of tepid cocoa and sloshing a bit. "I thought we could take these outside."

"Hm." Remus' forehead crinkles as he regards his mug. "Is carrying the mug a requirement for going outside? Mine's empty, you see, and I've no inclination to carry an empty cup around."

"I thought you were the nice one."

"Nice one of what?"

"You and Sirius."

Remus hums again, and though his lips do not so much as twitch, the gleam in his eyes tells her he's fighting a smile.

"Sirius certainly is not the nice one," he says, standing. "I am not entirely sure I am, but since I hate to disappoint a lady with a toe ring—" He nods appreciatively to her propped-up feet. "—I shall make myself another cup of cocoa and tell you what a splendid notion it is to take it outside."

"I think," says Tonks slowly as her insides perform moves more spectacular than any she's witnessed on the Quidditch pitch, "you're the _mad_ one."

"Probably," Remus replies, looking as if she's complimented him. He reaches for her mug and asks, "Can I make you another?"

"I'm still working on this one."

"Isn't it cold?"

Tonks takes out her wand, but before she can cast a warming spell Remus summons the mug.

"Warmed-over hot chocolate is no good," he says, vanishing the contents. "It must be drunk fresh."

"The cocoavore's a connoisseur."

"Naturally."

Tonks studies him intently as she did when he made her previous cup of hot chocolate, and she finds it quite a conundrum that Remus works more quickly this time. He is no less deliberate, but he seems not to be using the task to take control of thoughts and emotions, as before. Is he comfortable with this new path their relationship is taking? Or have they arrived at a dead-end? Maybe he's turned around…

The grandfather clock in the hall chimes, and Remus glances up at the kitchen wall clock.

"It's late," he says, stirring cinnamon into their mugs. "Are you sure you shouldn't go home and sleep?"

Before she can stop herself, Tonks asks flirtatiously, "Are you trying to get out of gazing at the stars with me?"

Her face burns again, but Remus flushes, too – adorably. His ears are especially red.

"Not at all," he says raspily. "But I do realise you'd guard duty last night and worked overtime today."

Tonks believes the Quidditch World Cup's taking place in miniature inside her, and she can't decide which is responsible for it: that Remus is aware of how she's spent the past two days, or the measure of admiration and respect in his gaze.

"But it's not my bedtime," she says coyly.

"When is your bedtime?"

"Later."

Slow grin stretching across his unshaven face, eyes never leaving hers, Remus hands her a steaming cup. Their skin brushes as Tonks's fingers replace his around the handle. The contact sends a shiver up and down the length of her spine, and she can't believe her fingers don't turn to jelly and drop the mug.

"Shall we?" Remus' husky voice brings her back to reality, but does not break the magic.

In his typical gentlemanly fashion, he steps aside for Tonks to exit the kitchen ahead of him. After a few quick steps toward the stairs, however, Tonks realises Remus is not at her heels as he usually is, but shuffling slowly behind. Her heart lurches at the thought of him wanting her to turn her back so she won't see his feebleness. Is he always ashamed for people to see him recovering from a full moon? Or is he more self-conscious because he sees her as a potential romantic partner and fears rejection?

Falling back to walk beside him, Tonks leans close and says in a low tone, "Reckon we can make it down the hall without Auntie screaming 'half-bred shape-shifting freaks'?"

Remus grins sidelong at her. "We've a sporting chance, barefoot."

As the lines of fatigue melt away, his face looks boyish. They creep up the stairs, and Tonks feels like they're daringly trying to sneak out of their dormitory and get past Filch. The image makes laughter well up in Tonks, but determined to be stealthy for once in her life, she holds it in along with her breath.

Remarkably, they _do_ make it down the hallway without waking Mrs. Black, and it strikes Tonks as oddly intimate when she exhales and then gasps for air, and Remus doing the same. As they catch their breath, she glances up at him, and her smile widens as she notes that, while peaky from their walk upstairs and down the corridor and leaning heavily against the wall, his eyes are bright and dancing and he's still got that youthful look. Especially with his hair sticking up like that, and his clothes dishevelled.

A yawn rises up from Tonks' lungs, but she represses it. Though it isn't quite bedtime, and she could stand to sleep, no way is she missing an opportunity to see more of this new side of Remus – or this new way she's seeing him.

"Ready?" she whispers.

Remus straightens up and reaches for the doorknob as he whispers back, "Mind the umbrella stand."

A defensive reply leaps to her tongue, but it dies before it escapes her lips. Remus isn't giving her a hard time. He's glancing sweetly over his shoulder at her.

"You're not wearing shoes," he explains, as though sensing her initial assumption. "It would be quite painful to stub your toe."

But as Remus steps aside to let Tonks through the door, a tell-tale thud indicates _he _has stubbed one of _his _bare toes on the infamous troll foot umbrella stand.

"Oh, bloody—!" He cries, bending to grab his foot, then hisses with a different kind of pain. "Hot!"

As the portrait awakens with the predicted epithets streaming from her mouth, it registers with Tonks that Remus has spilled his hot chocolate down the front of his shirt. She whips out her wand and performs a quick _scourgify _on him.Doors creak open upstairs, and feet pound on the stairs as Sirius bounds down to quiet Mrs. Black. Unable to think further in the cacophony, Tonks grabs Remus' arm and drags him outside.

He grunts as he puts weight on his foot. "I think…I think I've broken my toe." With a wry glance at the cup in his hand, he says, "It seems as though I've brought an empty mug outdoors, after all."

"Cosmic payback," says Tonks, pulling the door to with her foot, "for that smart-arsed professor humour."

"I'm in pain," says Remus in a pinched voice. The glimmer of amusement in his eyes, however, squelches Tonks' pang of guilt at having teased him. "Isn't that lecture enough?"

"Let's have a look," says Tonks compassionately.

She puts her hands on his shoulders and gently pushes him to sit. Kneeling beside him, she sets her cocoa to the side and casts a _lumos _by which to examine his toe. He grimaces as she gently prods.

"Definitely broken," she says. "_Episky._"

Her heartbeat quickens as Remus looks at her admiringly again – perhaps mingled with a little surprise.

"Thank you," he says, wiggling his toes. "Especially since you don't like feet."

Tonks glances down at his feet beside hers on the porch step. They're quite nice, as far as feet go, especially for a man's. Her fingers tingle as she recalls his heel being rather smooth against her callused fingers.

"You're not even remotely like a werewolf," she says.

"What do you mean?" Remus asks, a hitch in his voice.

Tonks wonders if it's possible to blush so frequently or so hotly that one's head catches fire. Especially when her eyes dart up to Remus and she notes a few buttons are missing from his shirt.

She gasps and claps a hand over her mouth. "Oh God."

Remus glances down, sees his shirt, then quirks a brow at her. "Little problem with your _scourgify_?"

Tonks nods. "It never goes quite right."

"No matter. The _episky _was the important one."

His easy manner puts Tonks at ease – for a moment.

"Or…" Remus stretches out his long legs and leans back on his elbows. "…are you just making excuses to look at my chest? Do you fancy me looking like the hero of a smutty paperback? What do you think, Nymphadora? Shall we conjure a breeze to ruffle my hair?"

"Don't call me Nymphadora," she says, though her laughter belies her.

The way he's reclining, his shirt falls open a little more. The waning moon gives just enough light that she notes a decided lack of chest hair.

"You're not hairy." Tonks closes her eyes and curses herself for speaking the thought.

"No." A question in Remus' hoarse voice draws her to look at him again.

"That's why I said you're not like a werewolf."

He gazes at her for such a long time that Tonks wonders if he is a Legilimens and reading her mind. But his eyes aren't searching. He just looks steadily at her, contemplating.

"That's nice to hear," he says at last. "Really nice, the day after…" He coughs. "…full moon." He coughs again, and cannot stop.

"Here." Tonks remembers her hot chocolate and offers it to him. "Have a drink."

"S'yours," Remus croaks.

"We'll share."

Remus' eyes never leave her as he sips her cocoa. Tonks watches his mouth, and follows his Adam's apple as he swallows. She notes the rim of the cup as his lips slide off, and when he hands it back to her, she drinks from the place he did and imagines the warmth there is his. It's a teenager sort of thing to do, she knows, and Remus observes her as intently as she did him. Merlin, does he realise what she's doing? She breaks their gaze.

But again, her discomfort lasts only an instant. Neither speaks as they look up at the night sky, the moon so bright they can barely see the stars. Comfortable silence blankets them as they pass the cup back and forth, and Tonks wonders how it can be this way between them, now that they're no longer just friends. They're something else now; they've got one of those indefinable relationships that could very well result in awkwardness and strain.

Instead, Tonks feels as easy as ever with Remus Lupin. They're making transition from banter to flirtation quite naturally – and oddly, Remus seems to be much more adept at it than she. Maybe it hasn't been banter for longer than she's realised. Maybe they've been flirting all along.

She yawns, and without thinking, leans her head against his shoulder.

"It's late," Remus murmurs.

Tonks means to be coy, but swallows her reply with a yawn. She nestles a little closer against him.

"I believe it _is_ later," says Remus, somehow having deciphered her muddled words. "For me, anyway."

He lifts his shoulder to indicate she should raise her head. The bottom drops out of Tonks' stomach as he pushes himself to his feet with stiff, jerky movements. She's gone too far. She's made him uncomfortable. Oh why is she so stupid about situations like this?

But Remus is holding out an open hand to her, and he smiles as a she takes it. His grip is hardly firm, and Tonks feels him shaking a little as she rises as if unaided. But the gesture is lovely, and Remus doesn't release her immediately. He pulls her a little closer to him than a friend would.

"Thank you," he says huskily. "Thank you for coming…and everything."

Before Tonks realises what's about to happen, he leans in and closes the space between them with a brief, feather-light kiss on her cheek.

He might be saying goodnight, and she might be saying it back, but nothing's coherent. Even the pulling, stretching sensations of Disapparation are dulled as she leaves him a moment later.

As Tonks' feet sink into the thick rug of her sitting room, clear thought returns: she's forgot her shoes at Grimmauld Place.


End file.
